Biodome (moss in a soap bubble).

I got a little bored today and decided to make a macro biodome. I put

some moss together and blew a soap bubble over it. From a

technical standpoint, I'm not excited by it all that much, due to the

reflections. This is not the best composed photograph in the series,

but rather it illustrates the problem I was having. Lighting was garish

CFL, indoors. ISO 100, Canon 100/2.8 USM Macro, Canon 5DmkII. I

tried a polarizer but it did not cut the glare significantly.

Any ideas on how I could have executed this better?

This is one idea I'm going to steal from you. An absolutely great concept.

It's the reflections that make the image, so I think You need to emphasize it, perhaps thinking what would make a good reflection. A traditional 4-square window (or the sun) seems like good bets. And think about where to place that reflection on the dome - some where off center. The light-bulb reflections seems a bit out of place.

Thats My two cents.

Thanks for sharing (I will go look for the other in Your series)

Cheers

/Svend Erik

Great idea! I agree that the reflection should be "increased". And what about a more neutral surface to hold the moss? Not too fan of the vertical crop. What could be interesting would be to use a tilt-shift lense to get the famous "miniature effect". Just my opinion, I've never tried to anything close to what you did. I'm looking forwards to see any development of your idea. Really original.

Best regards,

Alain

Thanks for the ideas! I think I might try this under controlled lighting on a more interesting substrate, combined with an arranged reflection. I think there is a cool photograph in this somewhere. The biggest challenge is he bubble itself...it usually pops when you try to blow it over a surface, and when it doesn't it only lasts a few seconds, so shutter speed much be fast. As for the tilt-shift effect...if I can narrow the DOF a bit, on an angle, I may be able to pull that off with the macro lens...after all, this is a miniature. I think I'll be taking a trip to the craft store tomorrow for some materials.

I went ahead and took another stab at it. The results are in my macro folder. Here is an example: http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=16507605